The Anarchists' Activities
In addition to the anarchist participation in the protests of the DNC, a group of anarchists, calling themselves the "August Collective", held the North American Anarchist Conference, a three-day conference in the days before the DNC took place. The conference was a convergence of hundreds of anarchists both from North America and abroad, and consisted of workshops, panels, speaking engagements and various other events. The recommended $25 donation granted access to the events for three days, as well as free housing (attendees slept on the floor in the warehouse that hosted the conference) and free meals provided by Food Not Bombs.
Due to the local media and LAPD-induced "Black Scare", the organizers of the event took special security measures during preparations. For instance, attendees of the conference had to "check-in" at a local vegetarian cafe called Luna Tierra Sol to get the address of the conference warehouse (a large orange building next to LA River that usually held "Raves"). The motive behind this decision was fear that if the LAPD knew the location of the conference, they would pressure the owner to cancel the rental of the building, a common scenario for modern radical organizers. In addition to this, the actual location of the building was withheld from everyone except the two August Collective members who secured the space. Despite this, the LAPD reportedly installed a video surveillance system on a nearby lamppost days before the conference, and removed it after the DNC had ended. This leak in security is generally believed to have been through law enforcement surveillance, such as wire taps.
Despite fear that the LAPD would raid the conference and shut it down, the conference went ahead as scheduled, and other than undercover surveillance, police presence was kept to a minimum. Among other things, many members and attendees suspected that the police would pressure the fire department to deem the nature of sleeping attendees as a fire hazard. However, nothing came of such suspicions.
Read more about this topic: 2000 Democratic National Convention Protest Activity
Famous quotes containing the word activities:
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